Joan Chan talks about dealing with numbers February 17, 2010
Posted by Mark Blei in : Uncategorized , add a commentHi, my name is Joan Chan and I’m part of the finance team in NYC. I love dealing with numbers. Organizing everything into an easy to read format just makes me happy. Odd, but quite satisfying.
I started working for Dynamic Logic soon after the acquisition by Millward Brown. Not only was I new to the company with a lot to learn, I also had to become familiar with our parent company’s finance software and people at about the same time. It was a great experience and kept me on my toes. It amazes me how a company can grow as fast as Dynamic Logic has. But I guess it’s not so surprising when we have a lot of great people in this company and I’m glad to be a part of it.
Joining Dynamic Logic has definitely opened my eyes to all the social networks that are available out there. It’s great to see the many ways we can be connected. One thing’s for sure, this type of media is exposing us to a lot more information out there at a much faster pace and it’ll be interesting to see where it leads us in the future.
When I’m not in the office, I like reading, cross-stitching, karaoke, spending time with friends and traveling. Especially cruises to the Caribbean. Believe it or not, my first time on an airplane was to Dominican Republic for one of Dynamic Logic’s annual all-staff meetings. Now I can’t stop traveling.
Gustavo Sanchez talks about opening new markets ( and comes clean about his obviously secret moonlighting gig as a crime fighter) February 15, 2010
Posted by Mark Blei in : Humor, Staff posts , add a commentMy name is Gustavo Sanchez. I have been a project manager for Safecount for little over a year now, working out of Puerto Rico offices. Recently I had the opportunity to work on the first Ad-Index study in Puerto Rico.
We worked with a major ad agency here on measuring the online components of a major ad campaign for a large advertiser. Our main study objective was to assess the effectiveness of the online campaign at increasing awareness, ad awareness, sponsorship association and purchase intent. Since our product is completely new to Puerto Rico (The Puerto Rico office mainly supports the New York office) it was a very rewarding experience to work on. We worked with US publishers on this study, but the challenging part was introducing our product to some local sites, specifically local news outlets ENDI.com and Wapa.tv, since they were not familiar with survey recruitment. Even though we faced some issues, recruitment was remarkably positive, and all people involved were really responsive to our demands.
Some of my interests outside of Safecount include music, family and friends. And comic books.
Rebecca Rahmanian has a confession to make February 15, 2010
Posted by Mark Blei in : Humor, Staff posts , add a commentHello! My name is Rebecca Rahmanian. I work as a Research Analyst in the New York Office ..
I wouldn’t admit this to most people, but I have a bit of an obsession with celebrity gossip. I like to read a lot of celebrity news columns and blogs such as People, Perezhilton, TMZ, The Superficial, Dlisted, and so on. For me, it’s mostly about the fashion. But I can’t lie; I’m also intrigued to know what’s going on in their lives. Which, at times, can be more interesting then gossip overheard at the Dynamic Logic water cooler.
Last May, our researchers were given the opportunity to conduct research in their field of interest. At the time I was working on two beauty campaigns, both involving celebrity sponsorships so exploring the effectiveness of such endorsements was an easy pick for me. Although celebrities are commonly used in advertising, their influence on the brand and its consumers seems somewhat unclear. In my research I hoped to discover how a celebrity’s presence in an online ad impacts a consumer’s recognition of the brand and their purchase decision.
With the help of our MarketNorms Database, I was able to isolate campaigns including celebrities against those with unknown humans and identify their effect on Aided Brand Awareness and Purchase Intent. My findings indicate that the endorsement of a brand by a celebrity can be persuasive. Yet, their presence may demand too much attention, taking away from the advertised brand. Thus the appearance of Ellen Degenerse Catherine Zeta Jones or Tiger Woods may attract internet viewers to the ad, but not necessarily generate awareness for the advertised brand. As a result, if the primary goal of a campaign is to increase awareness of a brand, a celebrity’s presence may not be helpful.
Meanwhile, consumers may find a celebrity’s endorsements to be sincere, leading to an increased likelihood to purchase the brand in the future. As a result, the presence of a celebrity in an online ad campaign which seeks to increase sales may be more effective.
While celebrity endorsements can have both positive and negative effects on an ad campaign, the one constant is that at the very least, they will generate a second look by avid gossip mongers like myself.
Amanda (Zuniga) Baskett talks about the final product January 21, 2010
Posted by Mark Blei in : Places you wish you were, Staff posts , add a commentThere are many aspects of my job that I really enjoy. However, there is nothing that tops the end of a project when all the data has been cleaned and weighted and it is sitting there waiting to be understood. Sometimes I think I must be a pretty sad person to be so excited about this (my older brothers reassure me that this is true), but then I also tell myself that this is the reason that I’m a researcher.
I love to tell stories – which isn’t surprising given my journalism and English background. In this job data serves as the basis for my story and the words are intertwined to shed light and explain what the data reveals.
In some cases, there are end results that are perplexing at first glance. However, by taking a deeper dive into the data as well as understanding what environment the campaign is running in helps to clarify the results.
For instance, the final results in one of my recent projects were negative especially given that the mid-way results showed positive movement. Instead of simply looking into various data cuts and writing a report based simply on the numbers I began my investigation with the numbers and quickly moved onto scouring secondary resources to help me explain what happened.
In the end I determined that the overall impact of the campaign was masked by negative results from a particular timeframe. Negative press surrounding the product category combined with respondents’ exposure to the ads triggered severe responses to the brand. Thus the overall poor results were not due to ineffective creatives or off-target messaging, but were driven by outside factors beyond the creative, media and brand teams’ control.
Nonetheless, a key lesson was learned. The results and insights have led the client to further investigate whether it makes sense to put a hold on a campaign if presented with a similar scenario in the future.
As a researcher we are not only tasked with understanding what the
data reveals, but to also shape a story that is meaningful for the client. There are often projects were there are different nuggets of data which you can mold an entire story around. It then becomes important to recognize what story would be most beneficial to fashion for your client. As we are all aware a media agency and a brand team have differing interests and markers of success. At the end of the day it is the combination of unraveling the data, finding the golden nuggets, and crafting a client-minded story that makes me enthusiastic about my job as a researcher.
In my spare time I like to eat and run – everyone always teases me for taking vacation days off to run a marathon or doing relay races through the mountains. I guess it is not everyone’s version of vacation. However, I know how to relax too the picture below is from my recent honeymoon in Hawaii.
Meg Reardon Talks about the power of looking “Beyond The Click” January 19, 2010
Posted by Mark Blei in : Staff posts, Uncategorized , 1 comment so farHere is a greaty example of the power of our AdIndex solution being able to tell the story of what happens ‘beyond the click.’
I recently completed an AdIndex study for a CPG client. The data from the media company regarding click-through rates and interaction was spectacular, indicating that click-through was much higher than the industry average and that interaction with the client’s ads drove great increases in consumer’s perceptions of and relationships with the brand.
Had that been the only data provided to the client, as is often the case without the additional insight provided by an AdIndex study, the campaign would have been considered a huge success and perhaps would have been replicated in the future.
However, since our AdIndex study provides insights on the impact of a campaign among those that click, but also on the other 98% of consumers who were exposed to the ad but did not click, a critical insight emerged. Based on click-through data, the campaign was working well to drive a specific message because the consumer had time to absorb and process the entire intended message. However, if a consumer did not interact with the ad or visit the client site, we noticed in our AdIndex data that there was a significant amount of confusion regarding the main message of the campaign that was leading to an erosion of brand perceptions.
Meg Reardon Research Director Dynamic Logic
This insight proved invaluable as creative was being drafted for the 2010 campaign. With the insight provided from our AdIndex study, the client was able to re-focus messaging and avoid potential further erosion of brand perceptions due to the confusion revealed in our study.
Just a simple, straightforward example of how important it is to not only understand the behavioral impact of a digital campaign, but also the attitudinal impact on the overall health of the brand.
!
Creative vs. Research – Can’t we all just get along? By Christopher Bian January 14, 2010
Posted by Mark Blei in : Staff posts , 1 comment so far
In the realm of the online advertising world, as with any other advertising discipline, how the creatives look and feel is perhaps the largest contributor to the success of a campaign. As you’re probably aware, the creative process for any advertising campaign can be a delicate one. Often, research can throw a proverbial wrench in the machinery of the creative discipline by “telling” the creative minds to “do it this way.” But I firmly believe this does not need to be the case; research is simply the compass that allows the creative mind to focus its energy towards achieving a specific goal. The key is to understand how to interpret and use the wealth of knowledge that the industry has amassed, as well as thinking forward to define the next set of valuable metrics as the technological capabilities of digital marketing evolve.
When thinking of analytics that can provide guidance for a creative team to work with and help maximize the impact of the campaign, there is more than one method. Copy testing is commonly used to test performance of multiple creative concepts against a panel of chosen consumers. Real-time diagnostic tools are available, such as Adometer, which allows marketers to evaluate chosen metrics or demographics and make tweaks to optimize the creative or media mid-flight. Normative data, which I’ll be focusing on here, has been aggregated over an extended period of time and allows marketers to delve into trends that may help shed light on the current climate. But remember, this type of research tells us what has or has not worked in the past, not necessarily what will work. When it comes down to it, a holistic approach is necessary to properly plan. There are multiple factors one must consider: nuances of the media plan, the type of product or category, goals of the campaign, as well as the metrics necessary in order to define branding success (lead generation, conversion, social action, ad interaction), just to name a few. In order to give a simplified example of how a marketer could use normative data to help guide the creative process, let’s look at interactive ads in the online space.
Here, we’ll explore the differences in impact of interactive creatives and what it’s implications on the execution of your creatives might be. For the purpose of the examples, some or all of the following aspects may be used:
- ability to interact with the ad
- display unit size of 300×250
- types of site the ad will be placed on
- campaign goals of new vs. established products
MarketNorms [Last 3 Years, N=2,377, n=3,697,267] shows that a 300×250 interactive unit has an overall larger impact on ad awareness (4.2% vs. 2.9%)* than a 300×250 ad that was not interactive. Both were featured on portals, which generally reaches a wide audience.
In this instance, the interactivity seems to have played a role in affecting ad awareness, which opens up a greater opportunity for your creative team to introduce an engaging experience with the brand and product.
While the interactive units impacted awareness metrics, there was no statistically significant impact on persuasion metrics. This does not mean that interactive units can’t help your brand drive intent or consideration, but rather, understanding the audiences you are attempting to reach is but one key to developing a successful creative concept. Take for example, the data amongst 300×250 interactive units that were advertised on niche site categories (compared to a typical portal such as MSN) in food/beverage, health/beauty, lifestyle, parenting and shopping.
^ Niche Sites defined as sites within the food, beverage, health, beauty, lifestyle, hobbies, parenting, family and shopping categories
The data showed a statistically significant increase on intent to purchase of 1.2% after exposure. All units advertised were interactive, yet, respondents exposed on niche sites claimed an increase in favorability and intent to purchase. Compared to those exposed on a typical portal, awareness metrics were impacted. We know that portals such as MSN or Yahoo! receive a wide range of visitors, reaching a general audience. Meanwhile, the visitor of niche sites like WebMD.com or Epicurious.com has come for information regarding something specific, and therefore, a higher incidence of relevance to a properly targeted product or service is more likely to occur. The question remains: how can we convert this information into creative output?
This example of data comparison serves as a supportive normative insight; if interactive ads are to be used, tailor the interactive elements to better align with consumers who are at different points of the purchase funnel, indicated by types of sites the consumer is to be exposed on. For example, the interactive elements for portal ad units could touch on the overarching features and benefits of the product in a simple, concise way in order to introduce the brand to those who are not familiar with the product. For established brands on niche site categories, your creative team will have the challenge of providing a more involved experience to those who are already aware of the brand and closer to any actual purchase behavior. Perhaps a store locator or promotional deal can be included within the ad unit to guide these consumers along the search/purchase process. Furthermore, a combination of both can be used for product extensions or medium awareness brands.
Through the normative data, it’s clear that targeting of media channels that properly align with your brand’s goals is necessary, precluded by the need to understand your brand’s audience on each channel in order to provide more value to the consumer at the creative level. While this may be one and albeit somewhat simplified example, it demonstrates that data can provide a healthy framework on which creative decisions can be implemented, without severely impeding on the creative process.
Every campaign is bound to be different due to the varying aspects that come into play: product category, high end vs. low end products, existing awareness of the brand or parent brand, budget, campaign goals, etc. But research is what can help tie it all together to give your campaign the best shot at success. After all, great creative can live in harmony with strong research trends and principles!
*Difference is statistically significant at 95% confidence, MarketNorms – Q3/2009
Alejandro Molina checks in with some helpful tips January 14, 2010
Posted by Mark Blei in : Staff posts , add a commentHi. My name is Alejandro Molina and I work on the tech team in the NYC office as a QA/Support Analyst. I was once an avid user of ad blocking software. But as time went on, I saw site after site close down due to lack of funds. These days, it’s hard to not see how important online advertising can be for sites that need the money to stay afloat. Even so, it’s sometimes hard to see online advertising in a positive light when I run into intrusive ads that take over the webpage and interrupt what I’m doing. Working at a company that tells these online agencies that such ads should be frowned upon is a good feeling.
In my time here, I’ve learned a few other tips about making online advertising more effective. Make sure your ads are not intrusive. Don’t interrupt the user’s experience if you can avoid it. Make the message relevant to the user. If I’m on a website that targets a specific audience, make sure you are advertising product that really is relevant to that particular audience. Also, make sure your ads are perfectly clear and eye catching without being annoying. Attention spans online only last so long, that if your ad is confusing or takes more than a few seconds to get the point, you’ve already lost half your audience scrolling down the page or clicking to somewhere else.
Keep to at least these points and even a former ad blocker like me will pay attention to your ad.
Lauren Mendelson discusses “Umbrella Branding” January 7, 2010
Posted by Mark Blei in : Staff posts, cute animals , add a commentMy name is Lauren Mendelson and I’ve been at DL for nearly 2 years, working out of the New York City office as a research analyst.
I recently conducted an analysis for a car manufacturer, who was trying to market four new vehicles at once. The goal of this campaign was quite lofty: the car manufacturer wanted to increase awareness of these four new cars as well as to increase intent to buy the models.
This type of online campaign is known as an “Umbrella Branding” marketing strategy. The key to these types of campaigns (according to Millward Brown’s March 2008 POV) is to have a consistent and clear brand identity across the various components. With Umbrella campaigns, when many models or brands are being advertised, research illustrates that only a few brands benefit and others get ignored.
This was the case with this campaign: while the creatives were synergistic and had a similar look and feel, not only to each other, but to offline advertising as well, some models received more attention than others. In this case, a luxury sedan and a minivan were more memorable and favorable than either the SUV or the coupe being advertised.
Additionally, this campaign differed from their past advertising in that it focused on multiple vehicles, which accordingly had different targets, different demographic variables, and different psychographic compositions. By trying to appeal to so many groups, this campaign did not resonate with their main target as well as past campaigns have, which were centered on only one type of vehicle.
Umbrella campaigns are similar to co-branded campaigns in that they often cause the viewer confusion. Often times at Dynamic Logic, we see that co-branding or Umbrella campaigns can have a negative effect; in this case, the creatives did not cause respondents to react in a negative way, but at the same time, the campaign did fall short of achieving all of its goals. With these types of campaigns, it is necessary for each car model to have its own moment of clarity, its own moment to shine.
It will be interesting to see how this car manufacturer decides to advertise their new suite of products. Will they continue to have ads that have a barrage of vehicles, or will they only feature one model at a time? I guess we will have to wait and see!
When not conducting research, I enjoy photography, traveling, and spending time with my new puppy.
Dynamic Logic Announces New Partnership with IRI and Introduces New Solution To Integrate the Branding and Sales Effects of Digital Ad Campaigns Findings from Pilot “AdIndex Connects with IRI” Study Demonstrate the Power of Bringing Together Attitudinal Insights and Purchase Data January 7, 2010
Posted by Mark Blei in : Dynamic Logic Press Release, General announcments, industry news , add a commentDynamic Logic Launches Optimization Tool, Delivering Real-Time View of Online Ad Campaign Performance
“Adometer” Gauges Initial Breakthrough, Enabling Creative and Media Changes to Be Made While Campaigns Are Still Live
New York, November 19, 2009 — Millward Brown’s Dynamic Logic, the leader in measuring digital advertising effectiveness, announced today the launch of Adometer™, an optimization tool that gives advertisers an early indication of a campaign’s performance. The tool is based on real-time measures of “breakthrough” including how memorable an ad is and whether the target audience is being reached. Adometer’s attitudinal measures offer an alternative or enhancement to traditional online tools that optimize based on click-through or lead generation alone, which can often provide a misleading picture of a branding campaign’s true impact.
“With Adometer, clients now have a reliable decision-support tool for making creative or media changes while a campaign is still live,” says Michelle Eule, Managing Director, AdIndex Solutions for Dynamic Logic. “While many factors play a role in campaign effectiveness, breakthrough is critical, especially when brand-building is an objective. By providing a real-time indication of whether or not a campaign is breaking through, advertisers can make necessary changes early on, before impressions are wasted.”
Adometer works by launching a short survey that appears directly within the frame of an advertisement. Results, which are delivered in an easy-to-use online interface, can be filtered by target audience or other audience segments, providing more granular insights over other solutions that offer single-question surveys. Below are examples of the types of actionable insights Adometer provides:
- Dynamic Logic Adometer Sample Output (click for larger view)
“In many ways, clients have their hand on the optimization trigger, so to speak, and they are looking for a reliable tool that can either confirm their advertising is working, or give them the insight to know what to change,” commented Jean Robinson, President of Dynamic Logic. “We believe Adometer will be a welcome addition to the market.”
Adometer can be used as a complement to Dynamic Logic’s more thorough, in-market measurement solutions. For more information, email sales@dynamiclogic.com.
New News: Dynamic Logic and IRI Partner to Integrate Attitudinal Insights and Purchase Data for CPG & Retail Marketers January 7, 2010
Posted by Mark Blei in : Dynamic Logic Press Release, Sales and Marketing , add a commentDynamic Logic Announces New Partnership with IRI and Introduces New Solution To Integrate the Branding and Sales Effects of Digital Ad Campaigns
Findings from Pilot “AdIndex Connects with IRI” Study Demonstrate the Power of Bringing Together Attitudinal Insights and Purchase Data
New York, December 2, 2009 – Millward Brown’s Dynamic Logic announced today the launch of “AdIndex Connects with IRI,” a new solution powered by IRI (Information Resources, Inc.) consumer and shopper insights. The solution is part of the DLConnects™ family of solutions and enables CPG and Retail marketers to answer the essential questions surrounding campaign effectiveness: “how did my online ad campaign impact consumer perceptions of my brand?” and “did it help drive sales?” The solution is built on the foundation of Dynamic Logic’s AdIndex®, the leading source for measuring the brand impact of digital advertising.
“As digital becomes a bigger piece of the marketing mix, we continue to develop innovations that bring together the best of the online and offline worlds,” said Mary Ann Packo, CEO of Millward Brown North America. “IRI’s consumer and shopper knowledge is a great complement to our expertise in building brands, and together we can provide insights that help move our clients’ businesses forward in the digital world.”
”Partnerships like the one that we are announcing today with Dynamic Logic enable marketers to quantify the offline sales impact of their digital media campaigns,” said Robert (Bob) I. Tomei, President of Consumer and Shopper Insights, IRI. “IRI’s rich purchase data and consumer insights combined with Dynamic Logic’s unique ability to measure the brand impact of digital advertising deliver an extremely powerful approach to fully understand the return on investment of their online media programs.”
“AdIndex Connects with IRI” integrates Dynamic Logic’s proprietary technology for determining exposure to digital advertising with IRI’s ever expanding view of the consumer and shopper (via its Consumer Network panels) which provides key purchasing, demographic, attitudinal and usage information. In addition to in-depth branding measures and short-term sales impact, the solution also assesses how effective a campaign is at reaching specific behavioral targets such as high-volume shoppers in a brand’s category or frequent shoppers of a competitor’s brand.
Case in point: In a recent study for a consumer packaged goods company, attitudinal data showed online advertising had positive results on brand metrics but did not significantly impact the number of individuals intending to purchase. Further investigation of IRI’s Consumer Network purchase data revealed that exposure to the ad campaign did result in incremental sales although not among new buyers. Rather, exposure to the online ad campaign drove existing buyers to make additional purchasing trips thereby increasing sales. Building on this story, Dynamic Logic then investigated the specific creative executions that proved to be more effective at driving purchase intent among existing buyers and made recommendations on how to enhance the campaign to resonate with non-buyers.
“While the industry has made great progress in moving ‘beyond the click’ in terms of measurement, the reality is that many marketers still evaluate their campaigns based on ad interaction metrics alone,” says Ken Mallon, SVP Custom Solutions of Dynamic Logic. “Dynamic Logic continues to believe that, in order to be considered effective, advertising placed on any media must either change people’s perceptions or increase sales. Partnering with IRI allows us to enhance our DLConnects ad effectiveness offering in a very tangible way and to continue to help clients maximize ROI.”
Media Coverage:
Top story in Ad Age today! View Ad Age article:
IRI-Led Consortium Aims to Tie Digital Ad Spending to Purchases
